Content Writer & Communications Specialist

Pacific Mind Health \| Part-Time Contract (1099) \| Remote (U.S.) — regular availability during Pacific-time business hours

Compensation: $50–$70 per hour, depending on experience, at approximately 15–20 hours per week to start. This is an independent-contractor engagement with genuine growth potential: as the practice’s content and media function expands, the engagement may convert to a full-time W-2 role with benefits, based on business needs and performance. Conversion is a possibility, not a guarantee.

About the Role

Pacific Mind Health, one of Southern California’s leading psychiatric practices, is hiring the writer who will own our editorial voice. This is a senior, hands-on contract writing engagement: you’ll produce clinically accurate mental-health content, run our earned-media pipeline, and get our clinicians and our brand published in outlets that matter — from our own blog and patient newsletter to national publications. You’ll work independently, on your own tools and schedule, against a defined monthly deliverables scope with editorial and clinical review checkpoints.

We’re looking for a journalist-grade writer with real health or medical writing experience — ideally in mental health — who is equally comfortable turning peer-reviewed literature into a readable treatment explainer, ghostwriting a physician byline, and pitching a story a national editor actually wants. You’ll work with AI writing tools daily to move fast, and with our clinicians to make sure every clinical claim is accurate and reviewed.

The two skills that gate this hire: (1) clinically accurate health writing, and (2) demonstrated earned-media placement. Everything else below is supporting scope we’ll help you grow into.

Clinical \& Editorial Content (the core)

• Write 6–7 blog, condition, and treatment articles monthly, plus a monthly patient newsletter and lead magnet — covering psychiatry, TMS, Spravato®, ketamine therapy, ADHD, and psychotherapy topics.
• Source clinical claims from primary literature and take every piece through our clinician-review workflow before publication — medication and treatment claims are physician-reviewed, and your work carries the reviewer’s credit.
• Ghostwrite thought-leadership articles and bylines for our clinicians, including our founder — always with truthful authorship attribution and affiliation disclosure to the outlet.
• Edit contributing writers’ work before it publishes — you are the editorial quality bar and brand-voice steward.
• Use AI writing tools daily to draft, iterate, and modernize content at speed — under our privacy rules (no patient or confidential data in any AI tool) and with rigorous human verification; fabricated citations are disqualifying in medical content, and we check.
• All publication, distribution, and external sends run through our recorded approval workflow — you draft and stage; approvals gate what ships.

Earned Media \& Publicity

• Own our media-opportunity pipeline: monitor and respond to journalist queries on source-request platforms, pitch proactively, and build ongoing relationships with health and lifestyle journalists.
• Land placements, quotes, and bylines in national and high-authority outlets — coverage that builds brand credibility and domain authority.
• Write our monthly syndicated article (mat release) and press releases for practice news — with clear sponsorship disclosure on all paid syndication, tracked separately from earned coverage.
• Support inbound media requests and coordinate clinician interviews through our approval process.

Communications \& Content Operations

• Draft patient-facing newsletters and announcements — content only, always privacy-safe; recipient lists and sends are handled by authorized staff in our secured systems.
• Maintain the editorial calendar and content trackers; contribute to the monthly marketing report on content and media performance.
• Apply modern SEO and answer-engine optimization (AEO/GEO) practices to maximize our content’s visibility in search and AI answer engines.

Where This Engagement Can Grow

The monthly scope above is the core, and it’s deliberately sized for a part-time engagement. As the practice grows — including new locations opening.

There’s meaningful room to grow with it, into work like: education content for referring physicians and therapists, a plain-language patient education library, podcast and broadcast placements for our clinicians, and the content and PR package for a new location launch. Future projects like these are scoped and agreed separately as they arise — this is the kind of opportunity the engagement can evolve toward, not a day-one expectation or a commitment.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Journalism, English, Communications, a health field, or related (equivalent professional experience fully accepted).
• 5\+ years of professional writing/editing experience, including health, medical, or science content — mental or behavioral health strongly preferred.
• A portfolio of published work: publicly available links or fully redacted samples only (please do not submit any confidential, proprietary, or patient-related material), including at least one health/medical piece.
• Demonstrated earned-media success — pitches that became placements, quotes, or bylines in recognizable outlets (not solely paid placements); we will ask how specific placements happened.
• Ability to read and accurately translate clinical literature for a patient audience; comfort working inside a medical-review process.
• Daily working practice with AI writing tools, paired with a rigorous verification habit
• Practical SEO content literacy (search intent, on-page structure); familiarity with AEO/GEO a plus.
• Excellent editing skills and unshakeable attention to factual detail.
• Organized and self-managing in a remote role.

Preferred Qualifications

• Journalism background (newsroom, wire, or trade press).
• Experience writing for or about psychiatry, therapy, or interventional mental-health treatments (TMS, esketamine/ketamine), including comfort writing within FDA promotional-labeling constraints.
• PR/publicity experience at an agency or in-house; existing health-media relationships; experience with journalist source-request platforms.
• Experience coordinating physician/clinician review workflows; AP style fluency
• HubSpot and email-marketing experience.

About Pacific Mind Health

Our mission is to deliver exceptional, patient-centered mental health care through innovation, compassion, and evidence-based treatments. We foster a supportive and inclusive environment where both our patients and team members can thrive. Our goal is to be an oasis of healing and a sanctuary of hope, empowering individuals to achieve whole-person wellness.

Work with us to help people Feel Better. Live Better.

Pacific Mind Health is an equal opportunity employer. We consider applicants for all positions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, gender, national origin, ancestry, age, disability, veteran status, or any other status legally protected by federal, state, or local law.

Pay: $50\.00 - $70\.00 per hour

Application Question(s):

• Are you available to work regularly during Pacific-time business hours for editorial and media deadlines?
• Please link 3-5 published writing samples (public links preferred), including at least one health or medical piece.
• Briefly describe one media placement you personally originated from pitch to publication.

Experience:

• Healthcare or Medical Professional writing and editing: 5 years (Required)

Work Location: Remote